Comatose Screams
by Erika Skyfire
Summary: So quiet she appeared' wrote the doctor. Never would he know of the tormented screams which echoed through the prison of her mind.
1. I

Authors Note : Please read and review. I don't know if this is any good. Or nearly demented enough. 

~*~*~*~ 

_Comatose Screams_

~*~*~*~ 

My world was an echo of my imagination. 

Windy prairies, gardens bursting with flowers, little cottages nestled into the corners of forests. 

People. Happy people. Animals. Happy animals. Everything laughing and talking and running and playing and working where did they all go? 

I went there once; I chased the White Rabbit down the hole. He came with me always, why shouldn't I go with him for once? Don't friends do that? 

I've forgotten. 

After visiting there, I ran home from the forest that was nearby my house. 

Happy years. 

I was eleven when I first visited Wonderland. With it's bizarre talking flowers and smoking centipedes. It was a happy visit right? 

People keep telling me it will be all right, that I'm going to be fine and that nothing horrible will happen ever again. When they don't fear to speak to me, that is. Why would they fear me? I haven't done anything ... oh, yes, I have. I laugh in my mind. My shoes feel packed with bandages. I feel vague memories of the burns on my arms and legs. I feel the slippery cuts on my feet. 

I feel oddly numb. 

My parents were killed last year, from the fire, and I only feel numb? I vaguely remember crying at the house, when I stepped on the broken glass as I attempted to pull open the door. The door handle burned me. 

I can still hear their screams. 

Mom, _go Alice, get out!_ Dad, _run Alice, don't look back!_ Then the White Rabbit, _Alice... Alice trouble is brewing, leave... the window, quick! We must save the breaking ..._

They all echo in my head. 

That forced me to leave the door, leave my parents, leave my stable world. Flame had licked under the door and set my room on fire. I ran, I tripped, I felt my feet bleed. Fire spread across my room, across the carpet, across me. I pushed myself up with White Rabbit and half wobbled to the window before blindly jumping through it. 

My family's screams still echo. 

That is why I'm here. When I sat up, I felt a shard of glass bite into my hand. I pulled it out and stared at the blood that dripped down from it onto my perfect white nightdress ... 

I began to drag it up my arms. Just to watch the scarlet liquid flow and drop on my nightdress. I missed once. It ended up in the snow. Slowly, it froze. 

That is how they found me. They tried to take away my glass! It was mine, mine to use, mine to break the purity! Selfish scoundrels, wanting to take away my toy. I tried to cut their purity. I injured two of them, their blood hit the snowy ground from their cut arms. The third I managed to get across the throat, he fell with a gargled scream. The fourth ran to call the police while another knocked me unconscious. 

I haven't spoken a word. I'm not really here. My mind falls in and out of each realm dangerously. I'm in a carriage right now. With the jacket on. It confines my movement and makes me feel uncomfortable as well. They've set White Rabbit in the crook of my arm and told me not to squirm - he'd fall out. Losing White Rabbit would be horrible, so I heed their words. 

They're moving me. I've been at Cambridge Institute for a year now ... was it a year? They said so. Not that I heard them. It feels like decades to me. 

They never say where they're taking me. But I heard a whisper from White Rabbit of 'Rutledge Institute.' Another institute with gray walls and barred windows. I stare numbly out the window and see the brick building. It seems so dulled from everything else. 

We've arrived at the gate. The guards pull me out of the carriage and bear me up the walk on a stretcher. I feel as if they are bearing me to my grave, myself in a coffin. A doctor is at the door watching me, eyes alert for any reactions to my surroundings. 

Suddenly, I hear a yowl and feel a weight against my chest. A cat has jumped on me. My bearers yell out in surprise. 

I am dropped to the ground. I feel nothing of impact, I simply see the piercing gaze of the cat. I howl in my mind. It's the Cheshire Cat with such an ominous face. 

_Alice, the world is in turmoil, you must help us,_ he says. 

I laugh in my mind. _I couldn't help my parents, I can't help you. _

He sighs and turns around, hissing at the guards. He sinks his claws into my jacket, as if claiming me from the institute. I laugh again in my mind and return to my blank staring. 

_Be strong, Alice,_ he says before jumping away, climbing a hedge. An orderly had waved a stick at him. 

I pretend not to notice the sad glance he sends me, or the dark glare he sends the doctor. 

And I am taken to my room. The doctor follows, writing in a brown book. I glance at the cover. 

RUTLEDGE PRIVATE CLINIC AND ASYLUM 

**CASEBOOK **

Patient: _Alice _

Date Admitted: _4 November, 1864 _

Physician: _Heironymous Q. Wilson _

Heironymous? What a name. I stare at him with dead eyes as he watches me through the glass window in the door. The orderlies set me on my bed and then leave. I stare up at the ceiling. 

I sleep uneasily that night. I've stared at this ceiling for hours now. The orderlies came in once to take off that confining jacket and feed me. I didn't respond, I don't care for food. It's always burnt and tastes like rotten meat. 

There is a storm outside. I hear the screams of the other patients, and hysterical laughter. They all are insane. I pull White Rabbit close to me, careful of his injured eye. I'm not like them. 

I'm not. 

I've never hurt anyone! I've never plunged blades into their hearts, caved men's heads in with a shovel, or pushed babies underneath a spring to drown! I am perfectly sane, thank you. 

Oh! I laugh silently. The man and the glass. The blood spilling from his throat. All right, I did that once. It was terribly exciting wasn't it? Wasn't it White Rabbit? 

White Rabbit hasn't responded to my calls all night. I'm slightly worried for his health. He's never left me this long without explaining. 

I turn to the window. Rain patters against the glass, leaving red streaks. The sky is bleeding. It is raining, sobbing, bleeding, all for me. The rain drips against the glass. Lightning flashes, and I see: 

hE_l_p, a_l_iCe, _h_eLp. 

And suddenly, a silhouette of a cat is thrown against the glass. I jump and look back up at the ceiling, clinging to White Rabbit even more. I'm not frightened. 

White Rabbit turns his head up to me and howls, "You must save us!" 

My screams echo throughout the night, blended with the rest in the ward. 

~*~*~*~ 

A month passes. 

The doctor is perplexed with me. He mutters incoherently about serums and potions, different medicines and what to do next. He's had me tied to this chair for an hour. He put a flame in front of my eye. I didn't see or feel it. How do I know it was there? I don't. White Rabbit is in my room, he can't tell me. 

I do remember the blocks though. The little hand blocks he clapped in my ears. 

_Clap!_ Look, Wonderland, once so tended and cared for, now spoiled and broken. 

_Clap!_ Hello, Dr. Wilson, are you still disappointed with my lack of progress? I'll never be healthy ... 

_Clap!_ Dear, dear Rabbit, why are you rushing so? All right, I'll hurry, but your stopwatch is broken! How do you know we're late? 

_Clap!_ Doctor! _Mushrooms, glades, and trees; watch the acorns explode from the flying bumblebees. _

_Clap!_ Plummeting through the dark abyss is not frightening. The chess pieces smile in relief; the cards swirl around me, begging me to throw them; the broken pocket watch stares at me ominously. 

_Clap!_ Dr. Wilson is calling the orderly to send me back to my room. Am I in reality? 

After I am set in my room with White Rabbit, I do believe. But he looks at me, and I look at him. 

The world fades around me, and again we fall into the dark abyss of chess pieces, cards, and broken pocket watches. 


	2. II

Authors Note : Please read and review. This part is a bit strange, but then again, the whole thing is strange. 

~*~*~*~ 

_Comatose Screams_

~*~*~*~ 

Days pass. The doctor stares at me from the door window. I'm silent and still. 

I have no real desire to move. I'm tired ... so tired in my mind. They attack, they scream, they hurt me in my mind. Their taunts and their insults ... their accusations. 

My breathing becomes labored as I fight them off. _Jabberwockies, stay away! Don't scream anymore! You nasty card guards, I'll lob off your head with my knife!_ They laugh at me, I slowly stab their veins. They die in their happy gloom, grinning maliciously. 

All I hear are their dying yowls: _White Rabbit is dead. _

_No, he's not dead, he's here, in my arms at the institute. See the doctor? He is writing things in his notebook. I almost screamed, but I'm a good girl. I don't show him pain. The world shows me pain. _

I break down in my mind. White Rabbit isn't dead though, he's here, here in my arms. Leading my instincts, showing me his pocket watch, forming solutions in easy time. 

I sob uncontrollably in Wonderland. Dead Jabberwockies stare expressionlessly at me, but still, I feel the malice in their cooling eyes. 

Suddenly, they howl in pain as they burst into flame. 

I jump back, feeling the flames lick over me again ... I don't feel any pain. The cursed creatures slowly quiet as they crumple into a pile of ash. 

I slowly pushed myself up, hearing the White Rabbits words in my head. _Please, don't dawdle Alice, we're very late indeed! _

I don't try and understand their combustion. I won't pretend to care. I walk through the world, fighting their insults, laughing at their deaths. 

And I'm still in my room with the bleak gray walls, the doctor staring for any sign of life, with a tarnished and burnt white rabbit. 

~*~*~*~ 

Wonderland is so broken and strange. Well, it was always strange, but not with skies of scarlet clouds that rained blood. Buildings were always of odd structure, but these are not stable. They crumple so easily. 

Dear doctor, what are you doing? Why are you tying me down? I'm a good girl, I never do anything wrong. The glass wasn't my fault! Doctor, doctor, can't you hear me? What ... what is that? What are you doing? Don't touch me, please, doctor, can't you see the burns? They still hurt, they howl and yowl and send pain all up my body. Is that a knife? Oh, how I'd love to play with it. 

Doctor! What are you doing? That hurts! Stop it! Why, why can't I move? I want to hurt you, slap you, take your knife and slash your throat. I've done it before, don't think I can't. But my body won't move, it won't even struggle in the bonds! Why ... oh... soft lighting, warm table. I'm so sleepy. What are you doing, doctor, that makes me so sleepy? 

Blood ... I feel it now. It's dripping off my hand, to make a small vibration as it patters against a metal platter on the floor. I hear it. 

Is it real? I don't know. Wonderland is raining blood again. It soaks my dress and stains my white aprons purity. But it already had blood on it from the card guards and howling Jabberwockies. I've hidden in a fortress now. Nothing really harms me. I've walked into a maze of stone walls and metal grates. 

I've killed three card guards now. More come. Oh, what to do ... what is that? 

I've come across an orb of red power. It is encased in metal, and hovers in the air in front of me, tempting me. I want to study it, I want to touch it, it calls me to do so, but they're coming ... they're ... 

_ Blood. _

Thirst. 

My skin darkens to a blood red. Pencil thin claws grow from my fingertips. I arch my back and a roar of power and pain echoes from me. I stand and horns curl from my head. 

Anger. Hate. Murder. 

Power. 

I throw the knife; it stabs a card guard through the throat. Two others rush me. I grab one and slash across his chest with my claws. His body is ripped apart and his body it thrown to the ground in two different pieces. I grab the other by the neck and his ears begin to bleed as I squeeze it. It cracks under my grasp and his head hangs limp. I throw him against a wall. 

Slowly, power wanes and I fall dormant. 

Staring at their broken bodies, I found what the Orb of Red Power does. I stare at my hands, the claws sinking into my flesh, and I feel my forehead. The horns are nearly gone. 

It turned me into a monster. 

My skin is pale again, if not more so, from my realizing panic. 

_ A monster hides inside you, ever waiting and patient, Alice _

Remember, dear, to control the beast that encourages malice. 

~*~*~*~ 

White Rabbit told me there were more doctors in my room while I was pursuing him. They changed my bandages of the burns that are nearly healed. They would be painful, had I not been in Wonderland. White Rabbit knows the best times to call me there. He knows when they come. He beckons me to safety. If you want to call morbid Wonderland safety. 

I've looked at my feet this whole murky afternoon. Didn't they change the bandages on my feet? They feel like they're there, but I look at my feet, and they aren't. 

My mind is playing with me again. 

As the sky outside darkens in my window slowly, I wonder. Will these echoes of my past always be there? I hate the memories, I hate the pain, I hate that the Fire happened. I want the pain to have died along with my parents. 

Maybe I'm just insane. 

_Of course you are, Alice, you think you're in an asylum for burning your parents,_ yell the Jabberwockies. 

_I_ am _in an asylum! Wonderland doesn't know of Reality? _

_You murdered your parents, you murdered that man, you murder us every day, and you want to murder the Red Lady who's in charge of this land!_ they shriek. 

_Death to Alice, death to Alice! _

"Off with her head!" 

I jump. Looking around my gray room, I see no one. I whimper and curl up at the headboard of my bed. White Rabbit is no comfort, he is away again. I'm so cold ... so cold. Heat rolls through the air in waves in Wonderland, I feel it's pressure, but I'm so cold in the asylum. The mixture freezes me. 

"Off with her head!" 

I jump again. I'm not frightened. Just startled. Why are the shadows speaking to me from the Queen of Hearts tongue? Why is she influencing them to shriek at me to die? I didn't kill my parents! I didn't do anything! I tried to help them, I tried ... I tried! 

I do not notice the howls that escape me. I thought they were the Jabberwockies off in a distance, being decimated by White Rabbit. I never make such infernal racket. 

The door opens. I'm distracted by the candle that seems to hang in the air by a nearly invisible hand. 

"Alice?" 

I'm completely still and stare at the nurse with blank eyes. I don't know why she's here, I wasn't doing anything out of the ordinary. Only crazy people do things like that. 

I do not notice that the shadows have retracted and I do not see any Red Queen hiding in the shadows. It must have been my imagination. Things like that happen often here. 

The nurse slowly backs out the door, eyes suspicious to me as if I was going to jump up and attack her with White Rabbit. I could, you know. She'd never suspect. I'd suffocate her with him, then I'd burn the curtains and throw them on her, and she's fall, fall like a Jabberwockies death, into a pile of crumpling ash. 

As soon as I've processed all this, she's locked the door. The candle is gone. 

I continue whimpering softly to the cries, "Off with her head!" 


	3. III

Authors Note : Please read and review. Thank you, you two reviewers who have done so! I really appreciate it. :) 

~*~*~*~ 

_Comatose Screams_

~*~*~*~ 

I _hate_ doctors. 

I got to the skool today. I leaped through the air into the window and crawled in. When I stood up, there was a little man walking in circles with a harness on his recently shaved head. He couldn't speak, he couldn't do anything but walk in circles in front of the door. I glanced up at the wall, and there was a perfectly scaled map of a persons head. On it were shaded areas. 

On the back of the head was a purple shaded area, with an arrow pointing at it. 

**Fear**. 

I took hold of the little man. He had no choice but to stay still. I looked at the harness that was strapped to his head. Where 'fear' would be on his head, was a small device. Whether clockwork or magic, it was causing him to walk in circles till he died. I looked into his crazed eyes. They were laced with innocence and fear. This was not a man. 

It was a _child_. 

A rage built up in me. These _monsters_ have been corrupting children, toying with their psyche, murdering their innocence, and sending them into deranged fits that control their fear. All to command them. 

I retched in Wonderland. 

I don't know what I did in the gray room though. I wasn't there. At all. But when I did seep back into Reality, I suppose I ripped my shoes off. There they were, at the other side of the room. 

My feet have no bandages on them. 

I also found a mallet in Wonderland. After loosing my patience with throwing cards at the card guards, I wielded my knife and had at them. 

I lost control. 

After I was done, there were only small chunks around the room. Bones were ripped one by one from his ribcage. They might not appear to have bodies underneath those card thin bodies, but they do. Those are an illusion. Meant to confuse. How do you kill a paper thin card guard? 

You do it very slowly and enjoy their screams. 

So there I was, on the balcony of the second floor overlooking the room. The carpet was soaked with blood and pieces of flesh and card strewn around. My hands were extremely grimy with the blood. 

I became frightened when I noticed that my knife had been pinning his hand to the ground the whole time. I did this with my _bare hands_. 

Curse Malice-Alice. 

I really _must_ keep her in check. 

Well, after I had calmed down, I noticed that there was a mallet on the other side of the balcony. Usually, the balcony would have stretched to it but it had been blasted down. 

I had to jump. 

I remember I muttered quite a long stream of curses. 

Well, I had no choice. I had to get the mallet, Cheshire Cat had told me to pick up anything useful. I doubted I could kill every monster that lurked there with my knife. It'd be so impractical to think so. 

So there I went. I jumped, caught the corner of the blasted thing and climbed up. It could have been horrendously difficult, but it wasn't really. 

I grabbed the mallet. It is definitely an odd object indeed. Its head is shaped like a flamingo. Like the first time I met the Red Queen and we played croquet. It's a very nice croquet mallet. It will come in handy bashing their heads in. 

I eventually climbed down and found my way into the study hall. The White Bearded Man had agreed to help me find a way to become small. I can't help it if White Rabbit likes to make me go in circles to find him. Well, anyway, he was there. After speaking, he triggered something that made the stage open up and ... 

It makes me sick. I kept my composure though. It opened up to more children. Four of them, all wearing their harnesses. One was shrieking in pain, then giggling insanely. The other was laughing with a glint of insanity in his eyes, then falling completely still. Another was sobbing dejectedly and then hopping around on one foot. The last just stared into space with a feral grin that frightened me. 

Their voices were all the screams from the asylum. 

~*~*~*~ 

I awoke this morning to a surgeon. He was just finished bandaging my burns. They had itched in irritation. I watched him. He smiled and started talking about normal things. Were they normal? Oh, yes, White Rabbit said so. He said things about how sad he becomes while he was here, listening to all these screams and not being to help anyone. 

My eyes widened. I showed response. He shifted uneasily. 

White Rabbit whispered to me. _His name is Grantham. Why don't you show him more then the ward? _

I slowly smiled, a dark, feral smile. I took White Rabbit and formed memories. I put the children in the stuffed toy. I held the toy out to Grantham. 

He was still uneasy, but he took it. 

I giggled as he suddenly stiffened. His eyes rolled back as if watching through my mind the pain, the screams, the agony. I laughed as his body began to twitch and spasm. He opened his mouth to scream but could not choke out a sound. 

White Rabbit fell from his hand. 

I have been watching him for an hour now. He stopped about ten minutes ago, according to the pocket watch in his white coat. I've picked up White Rabbit for warmth, since the ward is so cold. I haven't put my shoes on yet. 

Grantham wakes up and looks around. I sit very still, my legs crossed and eyes staring straight at him. He looks at me, chokes a bit and stands up shakily, practically fleeing from the room. As he locks the door hastily, he peers through the window. 

I am laughing silently, my chest shaking and a tear of mirth streams down my cheek. 

I _am_ insane. 

~*~*~*~ 

The asylum is strangely quiet tonight. No creature stirs in the night, they all sit and watch. Waiting. 

_Patience, Alice,_ I think to myself. I know what is coming. 

I have not moved all day. I stare at the door window, waiting for what I know will come. No one can handle Wonderland like it is. Why can I? I have White Rabbit to guide me. And Cheshire Cat. The White Bearded Man was nice as well. I remember the first piece of advice Cheshire Cat gave me when I appeared in morbid Wonderland. 

_As knowing where your going is preferable to being lost, ask. _

Pursue Rabbit. 

I have, I will, and ever more will watch for him. 

So I am watching the door. I don't know what I'm waiting for, but I'm sure White Rabbit will appear there someplace. He isn't here, he left when Grantham was shown the horrors of the skool. He took him on a guided tour of the pain, the misery, the demented joy. 

Suddenly, the window is illuminated as if a candle is coming down the hall. The light slowly brightens. The candle strays toward the window and halts. I knew something would happen, didn't White Rabbit say so? Just don't be frightened. It's not dark, it's light. The candle isn't burning life, it's burning death. A sickly, dusty gray that frightens and disturbs the murky shadows of the wards hallways. 

_Bam! _

I jump and see Grantham's face in the window. He's staring at me with a manic grin on his face. White Rabbit jumps to life in my arms. Grantham's eyes are a hysterical brown, but their dark hue makes them look like the pit to death. 

His keys are jingling in the lock. I place White Rabbit on my shoulder and walk calmly to the door to stare him in the eye. My green eyes hold power of a majestic Queen. I know he will not open the door. 

_You will not open the door,_ my eyes command. 

He slows his movements at the door, but he face contorts with such fury as he begins to scream through the window. He stares at White Rabbit. I stare at him. I command him. 

Orderlies have come to the hall. They think someone has escaped. They pay him no heed. 

He holds up a scalpel. He grins at me and walks away. 

I know he will not be dressing my wounds tomorrow. 


	4. IV

Authors Note : Sorry for the long update. Difficult chapter. Please read and review. :) 

~*~*~*~ 

_Comatose Screams_

~*~*~*~ 

I've been visited today. The doctor, dear Dr. Wilson, came to see how I was. See if anything was the matter. I know what he's doing. He knows I heard Grantham. He wonders if I had something to do with the sudden attack of dementia. He doesn't know that Grantham was at the door, but he knows I heard his death cry. 

White Rabbit told me what happened to him. White Rabbit followed Grantham to the Amputation Room. He'd been afraid to enter the room before, people would come out with half their arms off, or their feet wiggling with no toes. Then the doctors would follow with metal pans. They always walk by my door with those pans. It isn't my fault that they do. I looked in the pan once, from the window in the door. 

It held a hand in it. A hand, no more then 4 inches long. The person it belonged to couldn't have been more then ten years old. It was severed a few inches from the elbow, and the bone was at an angle that looks like they were hasty to remove it. But it was twitching. 

The person hadn't noticed me watching him go by. White Rabbit never saw it. Maybe I imagined the twitching. I can never be sure. 

I fear that room. But I have no fear. 

So White Rabbit went to see what Grantham was doing. After smashing the rooms jars, windows, and syringes, Grantham eventually began to dissect his own wrist. 

Goodbye Grantham. 

White Rabbit has been quiet and away since then. I wondered what he showed him. I put some of my memories in it but nothing that bad. 

_Alice, I know your upset and confused right now..._ White Rabbit awakes with those words. 

_Oh yes, I would love to know why the dear doctor died from my memories. How come I haven't? _

_I gave him more then just your memories,_ replies White Rabbit slowly. 

I simply stare in shock. How much more? Would I be that desperate to leave Wonderland when I came across what he showed? 

_Show me. _

_Alice, it wouldn't be safe. You saw how angry you became with the harnesses ..._ White Rabbit is concerned. And for good reason. 

_Show me. _

Two words. So little by themselves. So commanding when used together. My eyes do not leave White Rabbit's button ones. One has been plucked out accidentally. I don't remember how it happened. 

He is very, very nervous. 

_All right, I'll show you. _

~*~*~*~ 

Instead of going to the library like the White Bearded Man wished me to, I went to the stage again. The crazy children were there, and I tried to ignore them as I looked for what White Rabbit had told me about. 

There it was. A star encased in a circle painted on the wall in bright red ink. It was seamless with the wood and scarlet wallpaper, but still indented when I pressed it. 

The seemingly unimportant portraits on the wall cracked as they broke from the wall, sinking into opening floorboards that closed with a small snap! 

This left the wall, in all its red wallpaper, bare and alone. It looked very desolate. I was wondering what came next. 

It shuddered a little and gave a large groan. 

Then it was still. 

I pressed my finger to it and jumped back when my finger passed through it. It definitely was not wood and wallpaper anymore. My finger left a ripple. The ripple traveled up and echoed out into nothingness. 

All was still. 

"_No!_" 

I fell back on my rear. I covered my ears and screamed with the sound. The word echoed through the air, pressed against my body, sent a shearing pain through my mind and created a headache. I looked up and my gaze turned into a stare. 

The wall was sweating. Big, clouded red droplets were rolling down the wall. A face, writhing and mouth agape in pain, there was no doubt in my mind at what had caused the scream. 

Wonderland doesn't want me to see this place. 

Sitting on my rear, I stared up at the wall as it writhed some more. The face was silent, simply twisting as if in pain. There was an odd tug on my mind. Suddenly, pain seared through my head as the wall fell in a pool of murky blood. 

What _is_ it with this place and blood? 

I stood up and rubbed my temples, soothing the pain away. I looked behind me to the children and was slightly unnerved by the fact that they were not disturbed by these outbursts. I turned back towards where the wall had once been. 

There was a white room at the end of the hallway, black walls narrowing to the small doorway. What was held in the room, I could not tell. The contrast of the shadow-walls and the ethereal brightness at the end hurt my eyes. I began walking down it and jumped back as my foot hit the floor. 

The floor had illuminated a small trench that was covered by an icy pane. It ran the whole way to the bright room at the end of the corridor. But that was not what frightened me back. 

It was crawling with the amputated hands and feet. 

There was the girls hand, and there! I saw that foot only a fortnight ago. Would the ice hold if I walked on it? 

I had to take the risk. White Rabbit would be relieved if I came back and said I didn't see. I wasn't about to give him the satisfaction. 

I took a cautious step forward. I slid a bit but found it supported my weight easily. 

It was rather unnerving to see the amputated hands and fingers and feet try to jump at the icy glass. Right at _me_. 

After a period of slipping, falling, pushing away in a mixture of feeling disgusted and disturbed, climbing back up again and sliding to the end of the hallway, I made it. 

And turning to the white room, I stared in silent shock. 

There were no walls, just endless windows of glass that locked children in. Children with harnesses but also with so much more horrible things. On the glass held images that would shift from each one, and I recognized each. The amputated people, the amputated hands. A dream I had shortly after the Fire; masked men were taking babies and dissecting them while they were awake; I'd peer inside the gaping wounds and see flaming clockwork, twisting and turning in a dizzying way, their hearts simply dark, clouded gems of evilness. The images changed to a memory of when Teacher would yell at the children and smack the back of our hands with his metal ruler. I still had those scars. 

And these children had to relive them. 

There were small pieces of metal clipped to their eyelids and mouth. They were pulled back to where the child could never blink, never frown, always smile. Smile, happy! Aren't we now? 

But that was not all. In the middle of the room stood a small girl, brown hair, green eyes. She wore my dress. But she was so small. She couldn't be me. She smiled at the images around her while I tried to hold my stomach in. 

"Amazing how easy they are to control when you have all these horrible memories to feed them." 

She was serene. She was content. I was enraged. 

Before I knew what happened, Malice-Alice awoke and overtook me. 

She remains in pieces on the white floor. Her face still smiling, still staring at me with my green eyes, strangely alive in their death. They say one thing in their power. 

_You are not rid of me yet. _


	5. V

Disclaimer : I own nothing of the odd and twisted plot of American McGee's Alice. I simply borrow. 

Authors Note : Hope this was worth the wait! Read and review. :) 

~*~*~*~ 

_Comatose Screams_

~*~*~*~ 

I was angry. I was sickened. 

I didn't want to control Malice-Alice. I wanted to cause as much destruction to this hellish clinic as possible. 

I began to smash the windows, ruin the images, trash the rooms inside. 

Whenever I'd finish a room, I'd notice another down the line. 

Endless. 

That didn't stop me. Half the time there were tears streaming down my cheeks at how many rooms were here, how many children were here how many had lost their innocence. Because of me. _Me_. 

I didn't save mom and dad. I barely saved myself. I lost my sanity. 

~*~*~*~ 

I am blank. 

I just stare. 

I don't see anything in Wonderland or Reality. 

I just destroy. 

I am lost. 

~*~*~*~ 

"You know, you could try to be useful." 

I jump and look behind me. Sprouted in the middle of the bright room is an oak tree. I glance up at it, examining the old appearance of the branches. _Where did the tree come from?_ I wonder. 

"I am. I'm protecting these children," I reply to the tree. 

The bright grin appears above a branch and the mangy cat follows, lounging comfortably. Cheshire Cat. He smirks at me and twitches his tail. 

"Nothing will help them if you insist on wasting your time here." 

I eye the cat warily. He never says anything without a reason ... what is he driving at? 

"If you like to sit here for another decade and end up hurting the world more then saving it, then by all means, do." 

My confusion is apparent on my face. 

"What decade?" I ask. 

"Time flies when one is having fun." 

Cheshire Cat grins at me, an odd glint in his eyes as he disappears. I frown and look around. 

The compartments around me are destroyed. Only, a few yards away, I see that the direction I had come from ... the compartments looked fine. I had destroyed them ... but now they're fine. 

Stupid bloody thing, it regenerates itself! 

Cheshire Cat was right. I am wasting my time here. I should ... where should I go? Where was I going before all of this ...? The library! Yes ... how do I leave here ... 

The way back was amazingly quick. I only walked about an hour when I saw an end to it and the familiar study hall. I avoided looking at the compartments, fearing I would lose control of Malice-Alice once again and start pillaging the area again. 

Walking back into the red wallpapered room, I felt my senses reawaken. 

~*~*~*~ 

My room at Rutledge hasn't changed a bit. White Rabbit is still here, my arms clinging to the soft toy. For a while, I could only move my neck. Looking around, seeing everything as I last remembered it. I feel oddly detached from my body. I must have been laying here for some time. 

Slowly, ever so slowly, does the feeling in my arms come to me. 

Little pinpricks of heat tingle all up and down my body. It feels as if I've forgotten how to move. Heat slowly washes over me and I attempt to raise my arm. It stings, but I do it anyway. 

Suddenly, I shiver as the heat passes and I feel how cold this room really is. 

I scramble up to wrap the blanket that's on my bed around me. I'm shivering and shaking and I don't think it's from the cold. I've been comatose too long. I should tell someone. 

I attempt to speak. 

Only nonsensical mutterings escape my throat. How do I explain if no one can understand me? 

~*~*~*~ 

I sleep for days, in Wonderland and Reality. I can't run away from the memories of the children. Their blank stares, grinning lips, fidgeting hands that never seem to calm from the adrenaline of fear. They call me back, they wish to detain me once again, for years, so that I'll never follow White Rabbit and find the way to fix this place. They hurt me and stab at my soul that the man and the broken piece of glass didn't. 

What's to say of someone who will kill grown men and actually _enjoy_ it, but is sent into a state of mental distress at the sight of tortured children? Is that normal? 

I need to ask someone, but I don't know how. 

So I drown in painful dreams. 

~*~*~*~ 

About a week later, I got up. Reacquainting myself with my body, the one that is ten years older then my mentality. My hands were slightly larger, my hair darker and longer, and I assume my stare even more deadly. I shuffled around the room in circles, waking my muscles, numbly trying to understand how to explain what was happening. But at the same time, I wondered if it was worth it. Maybe it was a waste of time. 

But then I saw it. 

Rolled under my metal bed was a small pencil. The nurse must have dropped it when she came in to check on me recently. Rather foolish, I could stab anyone; myself, her, the doctor. The glass proved that. 

I stooped over and picked it up. 

It was smooth and cold from sitting alone on the stone floor. It was slightly faded, as if it had been used often for a very long time. It was nothing special, like everything in this institute. 

And yet ... it was perfect. Perfect for what I needed. Now I just needed one more thing. 

~*~*~*~ 

I'm not really sure how I got a piece of paper. Maybe the foolish nurse left it accidentally. All I felt was my hand, skimming over the paper, sketching lines that flowed from my mind. It took so long for me to decipher what I was writing, until the end result. 

Cheshire Cat in his tree. 

He looks so deranged in Reality. Such a contrast to the normal gray walls and yellowed paint on the ceiling. Quite usual in Wonderland ... but unusual here. 

I got a headache one night trying to figure it out. 

Well, I presented the picture this morning to the nurse. She looked quite shocked, to tell the truth. For someone so dormant and hidden in a cocoon of pain, I certainly showed no sign of awaking. Why now? 

I honestly don't know. The Cheshire Cat could have left me for decades more and I wouldn't have noticed. I would do anything for those rooms to be purged and the children to be restored. 

Innocence is so precious. 


End file.
